Tricks
by Penelopi
Summary: Shute's having a bad night chasing Grappler Gouf in an abandoned theme park, in the rain, in a borrowed body, while running from swarms of persistent outmoded and abandoned robots reprogrammed by the Dark Axis. Then, the trail leads to a haunted house. Blurb made from a cut segment of Little Wing's Chapter 20. Happy Halloween!


**Author's Notes**

Okay. So. I was trying to get Chapter 20 of _Little Wing_ done in time for Halloween because it's spooky and that would've been great timing. But, it's just too freakin' big. I still have a lot of rough spots to work out, and I can't get it done in time without posting less-than-my-best. I really wanted to post something for Halloween, though, and I also was looking to shorten the chapter and prevent a middle-of-the-read slowdown. I decided to cut some fluff. But, because it was quite a fun passage, I didn't want to get rid of it completely. So, I do what I do and cut the fluff to make it into a little one-shot/drabble for you all. (Well, that's what I hope is something I do. I haven't gotten that Movie Night one-shot done for you all, yet. Many apologies: I just got really busy and have been trying to keep up with writing completely new 5,000 to 6,000 word chapters every two weeks for _Little Wing_.)

This scene takes place during Shute's chase after Grappler Gouf. They've left the laser maze and are running around the park trying to get at each other.

Now, I'm going to give the background for this scene for those of you who haven't read _Little Wing_ , yet, or who haven't gotten through Chapter 19. But, I warn you, it will have **spoilers** for the story if you haven't gotten to about Chapter 18. Here goes **spoilers** : the setting is an abandoned park where Grappler Gouf has hidden hostages. Shute is pursuing him in Captain's body, because magical fun accidentally switched the two. **end spoilers** I hope that helps give context, though if you want to get a fuller understanding of what's going on, you'll have to read the larger fic ;) This is best read in conjunction with Chapter 20, which will come out next week.

Enjoy!

 **Disclaimer**

I hope no one's convinced at this point that I own SD Gundam Force. If they do, they're mistaken, because Bandai and Sunrise own it. I made up the story elements of this fic, though :)

* * *

The drizzle beat the abandoned theme park. Mud had parted where Grappler's jets had blown, forming a frozen wake behind him. Shute, running in Captain's borrowed legs and scanning ahead with his borrowed visual sensors, plowed over the path as he followed it to the entrance of a two-story smooth building. The structure seemed to be made from bolted steel plates with prominent seams. Two thick, round-tipped antennae stuck up from the roof, completing the kooky design. If it weren't for the lashes of rust stains, it would have fit in a Saturday-morning cartoon. _"Mad Scientist Lab,"_ the Gothic font over the double-doors read.

The doors stood ajar, and the mud flush led directly inside. Shute kicked another rust-stained old Bit Bot rushing into his path, ran in the building, and threw the doors shut behind him. And jammed a long fallen pipe (mold and rust had chewed at a connection joint until the water pipe had broken and dropped a segment on the floor) in the handles for good measure. A few bangs hit the doors, shaking them on their weathered hinges. Shute breathed deeply to cool his hot circuits. Surely, those plain, knobby-jointed, obsolete, Dark Axis-commandeered service robots couldn't beat the door down anytime soon. Though, they had managed to pull off chunks of his armor when given the chance...

Shute glanced at his twisted shoulderguard and flaking leg armor. And at the scorch mark on his foot from Grappler Gouf's laser beam tricks. His diagnostic system reminded him of the laser burns on his back and v-fin. _Not too bad, yet, but I can't take many hits like this before I really hurt Captain's body._

Shute turned to face the room behind him. "Grappler Gouf! Show yourself!" he called. His voice echoed in a vast space, and his headlights revealed dusty white tabletops and a slew of desks with computer monitors and keyboards. Shute crept in. His light shone on a boxy... He panned the lights further. On the table lay a human-proportioned robot with a human head screwed in at the neck.

"Gah!" Shute jumped back. His sensors detected heat from the shape. But, upon analyzing it further, the head's composition was of metals and plastics instead of human flesh. "It's fake," Shute breathed. "But..." He visually traced the heat in a line across the floor, to a bundle of heated lines, which then led to a wall. Shute looked in the direction of each of the other lines and found a sharp-toothed mono-eyed robot with red-dyed fangs, a silver robot wearing a lab coat and holding a facsimile of a human heart, and a skeletal frame with wires but no outer plating. "They all have power, which means..."

Whirs and clicks sounded. _"Welcome to the Lab of Horrors,"_ a nasally voice buzzed. The voice crackled at the volume peaks, indicating that the speakers had lost the capacity to tolerate the recording. _"My name is Dr. Vinkenstein, and I have collected here various abandoned robotic experiments that interest me... namely, the ones that were forbidden due to high human casualties."_

Shute sidled towards the door on the other side of the room, rotating his view between the four different robots warily.

 _"These are historically-accurate replications of these experiments. Let me explain them to you. Dr. Kingsley wanted to make an android that imitated a human perfectly. He activated it before finishing the exoskeleton so that he could test the personality programming. Unfortunately, the android's programming was faulty: it believed that it was a human, and it was horrified that it had no skin. So horrified that it tried to acquire the skin from living humans. Be careful that you do not donate your epidermis, today~"_

Said skeletal android began to stand. "I was afraid of this," Shute gasped, backing away.

The other three also rose as the voice continued, _"Cyclops was made by a troubled hobby roboticist who wanted to take vengeance on the world for his loneliness. It sliced humans between its razor-thin teeth. Doctor Rob was a robot designed to treat the ill, but it had procedural problems that caused it to perform heart transplants using healthy specimens. And Headmaster here was the result of an illegal bid for immortality by attaching human brains—and heads—to robotic bodies—of course using involuntary subjects."_

"This is not funny, Grappler Gouf!" Shute shouted, though he quivered and clattered in his armor. Even though he knew the replications were fake, in the dark and with the context of the horrific tales they appeared quite ghastly. "I-I'm not scared!"

No light blue helm popped behind the tables, though. Wherever Gouf was, he was not in that room. And, the robots were moving towards him. After the Bit Bot reprogramming, Shute could not convince himself that they were still harmless park attractions. "Gotta go!" He darted for the other end of the room.

The robots began to run, which made their low-key hydraulics wheeze. Shute screeched. _I don't think that's part of the script!_ The human-headed robot grasped his shoulder. "Let go!" Shute screamed, flailing with wide eyes.

...

Grappler Gouf laughed so hard that his screws started to loosen. He toppled off his chair: he was in the control room for the entire haunted house exhibit, where he could watch the multi-screen display of the sets and manipulate the many switches for power, lighting, sound, and commands spread on a semi-circular dashboard. "I can't believe how scared he is! Although," he added, pulling himself up, "I'd be scared, too, 'cause those things can rip a car apart."

Then, his eye locked again on the camera display for the entrance hall, and he gaped. "W-Wha...?"

Within the few seconds he had been on the floor, the Gundam had torn the plastic human head from the android's body and caved in the chest. As the commandeered attraction fizzled on the tile, the culprit wrestled with the door and the other three robots. Gouf growled.

...

Shute yanked open the door as he felt his assailants yanking off his shoulderguard and a rear skirt armor piece. He swat them with his big hands. "Shoo! Shoo!" he demanded while pulling the door shut. The skinless robot yanked and snapped the door, and the lab coat-wearing robot reached for Shute's chest. "Aaaaaaahhhhhh!" In a second, the beam saber was flying every which way, cutting apart the machines like box cutters cutting cardboard. "Aaaaaaahhhhhh! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!" Shute had deactivated his visual sensors in his terror. But, when he realized the whirring sounds stopped, and his proximity sensors detected no movement, he opened his eyes to see that he was only cutting air: his diced opponents lay in pieces.

"Aha..." Shute laughed nervously, his metallic voice bouncing around the room. "Ha..." He slipped into the next room and closed the door. "No one saw that."

* * *

 **Author's Notes**

Kids are kids XD

I made the backstories of the haunted house exhibits, though _Titanic X_ supplied the Dr. Vinkenstein name. It was challenging to come up with four original robot-related horror stories so quickly. I wrote with the intention of them being legit history in my version of Neotopia's Earth, but you can interpret them as fiction-fiction if you want, because I don't think it'll really come up, again. I just thought they were nice additions this close to Halloween. _Titanic X_ beta read this while it was still in Chapter 20, and she really wanted me to keep it (as did I) XD I hope it's met the bar.

Fun fact: Vinkenstein is a real last name.

And for those of you who were wondering: yes, I named the "Bit Bots" after the GX-Bits of After War Gundam X.

-Penelopi

12-28-15: For those of you who like _Little Wing_ and would like to support the story, chapters 1 though 20 are posted on Inkitt as a volume ( _Little Wing: New Home_ ) and submitted to their fanfiction contest Fandom 3; it could use some votes to get into the top 10% for a shot at placing. To vote, visit the story's page at www . inkitt stories / 49832 and click the heart at the bottom (you need an account but all that's required are a username and e-mail and password). Votes close January 28th. Thanks for helping out!


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